Dabiz Muñoz, the millionaire accounts of “El guindilla” by La Elipa

Dabiz Muñoz, the famous chef from DiverXo, reaches the age of 32 touched by the magic wand of success. The most atypical chef in the Michelin guide, is living his best professional and personal moment with a large part of his goals fulfilled. His path to get here has not been easy.

David –or Dabiz, as he likes to write it– comes from a middle-class family in the neighborhood of La Elipa. The son of an industrial engineer, his love of cooking from a young age made his father take him at the age of 14 to Abraham García’s Viridiana restaurant.

The experience would mark him for life. At that time, Dabiz combined his COU studies at a distance while playing football in the lower categories of Atlético de Madrid.

His vocation in the kitchen led him to join the Hospitality School of Torrejón de Ardoz, where he managed to combine his studies with internships at the Balzac restaurant, one of the most traditional in the capital.

After finishing his studies, he met Ángela Montero, a dancer who abandons her fledgling career to unite her destiny with the young cook. Ángela, in addition to her girlfriend, will become a partner and head of the future DiverXO room.

Together with her he lived his difficult beginnings. In 2007 they inaugurated the “first” DiverXO», a small restaurant in the Madrid neighborhood of Tetuán. For this they pawned even the shirt. They applied for several loans, sold their house, their car and spent all their savings.

The famine was such that the restaurant’s back room served as the couple’s bedroom for a while. The talent of the chef from Madrid quickly spread the word among the specialized press and the general public. It was the first step in the ascent of “the chilli pepper”, as his friends in the neighborhood called him when he was little.

DiverXO, the alma mater of Muñoz’s corporate structure, was established in September 2006 with a share capital of 48,000 euros. The company is part of the chef’s business matrix, Dukes Road SL, the name of the company through which Dabiz Muñoz runs the business.

DiverXO has established itself as one of the most established restaurant businesses in the national gastronomic offer. In terms of money, the company has numbers within the reach of very few. His last account balance presented, dating from 2019, supports him.

In that exercise, the Dabiz Muñoz store recorded in its sales some historical billing figures in its historical series. In that year invoiced 9,279,628 euros, a record amount, with an increase of 16 percent, if we compare with previous years whose revenues were around 8 million euros.

These are numbers that guarantee the chef and his peculiar way of seeing the restaurant business. The local menu has prices within the reach of very few pockets, which does not, however, prevent the restaurant from hanging the “full” sign day after day.

The success of its innovation in the kitchen has elevated DiverXO to the pinnacle of culinary excellence. And not only when it comes to food. “The kitchen of the flying pigs”, the name of the DiverXO tasting menu, is already the most expensive in Spain.

The Madrid chef announced before the end of 2021 the increase in the price of his tasting menu by 46 percent. Recognized as “Best Chef in the World 2021″, Muñoz explained the reasons for this increase, justifying it with the increase in the cost of raw materials or his desire to raise the salary of his employees.

Thus, since January 1, the large clientele scratches their pockets a little more from the 250 euros, which it cost before, to the 365 euros, which it costs today.

For this price, the diner can enjoy a menu where, under the name “The DiverXO roller coaster”, they can enjoy five dishes with a clear Asian touch: Thaipiridha, Pad Thai, Indonesian Saté, Green Curry, Singapore Laksa and Som Tam.

The starters are followed by 20 dishes that the kitchen team distributes in the most coordinated way and without a set order, always to the taste of the consumer.

The “Galician lobster waking up on the beaches of Goa”, “steam explosion with pil pil echinoderm ribbons” or the “cold pigeon marinated for a week”, are other of his most successful dishes among the public. Outside the menu, the restaurant offers wine pairings at two prices, one option for 150 euros and another for 300 euros.

In total, the price of the experience ranges from 515 to 665 euros. To all this we must add other extras not included in the menu such as water and coffee.

David Muñoz

The failure of StreetXO

Although the word success is linked to Dabiz Muñoz, the chef has also experienced the thorns of failure in his flesh. In May of last year had to close StreetXO London, as a consequence of the crisis derived from the Covid.

Muñoz’s riskiest project in the United Kingdom was an unsustainable waterway where he lost 50,000 euros a month, just by renting the premises in the Mayfair neighborhood. At StreetXO London, the chef tried to hold out as long as he could, even doubling the bet by buying back his share of the business from his partners for 3 million euros.

“It was a difficult decision to decide if we could take it or not. And I chose to close it, even at the risk of being wrong. Time has proved me right. We had gotten too much in debt and I was risking losing what we had achieved in 14 years,” acknowledged the chef.

A failure that generated quite a few criticisms of the chef, who has lived since his inception on the wire between love and hate, facing his supporters and detractors.

His indomitable character, his groundbreaking “look”, with a crest and piercings, and his tendency not to bite his tongue, have made him the target of many who do not forgive him for the media exposure he shares with his wife, Cristina Pedroche.

Despite the criticism, Muñoz continues to convince his colleagues. Last December DiverXO got the best news. It maintained the three Michelin stars, the highest international culinary award, it is one of the 11 restaurants that have the distinction in Spain in 2022, and the only one with 3 Michelin stars in the capital.

The first star obtained in 2009 would be followed by the second two years later and the third obtained in 2013. With this Madrid once again had another restaurant with three stars, something that had not happened since 1995, when Zalacaín, the restaurant of Luis García Cereceda lost that distinction.

Dabiz Munoz and Cristina Pedroche

Gourmet Experience

The success of DiverXO encouraged the chef to expand the business, diversifying under the same concept of fusion cuisine. In January 2015 he created StreetXO, his most informal gastronomic proposal, moving from Callao to the new “Gourmet Experience” of El Corte Inglés de Serrano.

At the end of 2020 Muñoz also founded Goxo Food Services. The idea behind the project was as great as it was innovative. The new brand sought to give a twist to the online business through the so-called “blind kitchens”. The idea was to take advantage of the surplus from the stoves of its restaurants for home sales.

The company, integrated into Muñoz’s business holding company, Pig Wings, was looking for a way to exit the business in the midst of the coronavirus crisis that affected restaurants so much.